Do You Know the Way to San Jose?
I am so directionally challenged that if I were a lemming I couldn’t find my way off a cliff. People ask me which direction my house faces. “Why the street I tell them,” not entirely facetiously. Some folks are born with an internal compass that enables them to find their way out of the woods. I’m lucky that I find my way out of my house each morning. This is a failing that has been inherited by the Schottenfeld women—neither of my daughters excels directionally. When Mariel won a gorgeous compass as an award in Geology I was hysterical. She’s definitely going to need that.
My one redeeming directional feature is that once I’ve learned how to get somewhere I can find my way back again without breadcrumbs. It’s the initial trip that scares me. Thank God for my husband, Steve. He finds me directions and teaches me routes. Without him I would probably use a map to line the trunk of the car.
I thought my problems were finally solved when I bought myself a GPS. I pictured myself effortlessly following its directions, discovering new horizons, never being afraid of getting lost in the maze of Boston’s streets again. I was giddy with excitement. This is what Lewis and Clark must have felt like when they hired Sacagawea.
When the GPS arrived I drove the car out to the driveway so that the system could lock onto a satellite and I could begin to use this wondrous implement. I chose a soft woman’s voice as my navigator. She would be my traveling sister, leading me onward, never letting me get lost, choosing scenic byways and gently rolling hills. It was a nice fantasy while it lasted.
The first time I used it was on a route that I already knew. Mariel and I were running errands and I thought that it would be the perfect time to take the GPS out for a trial spin. The problem was that I was trying to read the map at the same time as I drove. Since I wasn’t wearing my reading glasses I was squinting like a nearsighted squirrel which resulted in a few near misses. Mariel yelled at me to keep my eyes on the road or she would rip the navigator off the windshield. I tried using it one more time, not much more successfully, and then left it sitting in its box, until I got a call from Lisa.
“Mom, I think I have the flu,” my poor daughter told me. “I feel so dizzy that I can’t get out of bed. Could you come tomorrow and take me to the doctor?”
“Of course,” I answered as any self-respecting mother would. “Can I bring you anything?”
“Well maybe some juice and some soup.”
“No problem,” I told her. “I’ll be there.”
Despite what I had told my daughter there was definitely a problem. I had never driven to her apartment in Somerville so I had no idea how to get there or for that matter how to get from her apartment to Beth Israel Hospital. I had my usual reaction to these kinds of situations: panic first then ask my long suffering husband to figure out how to get me from here to there and back again.
By the time he was done I had three sets of directions complete with maps and Powerpoint presentations, but just in case I decided to take the GPS for back up. You would think that I was traveling to Siberia. Luckily Lisa was feeling better so she could serve as my navigator. We work well as a team. She tells me where to go and I drive there. We agreed that the GPS added a certain charm to the whole adventure this time.
We had barely driven the few blocks to Mass Ave. when we had our first disagreement with Madame GPS. She insisted that we go left, but I was determined to go right and so I ignored her directions. When we reached Harvard Square the altercation escalated. Steve had instructed me to go down Massachusetts Avenue but Madame G. insisted on Memorial Drive. Each time I went one way, she insisted on another. Finally, after dealing with the crazy traffic and a GPS that was obviously experiencing PMS, I began to scream at the thing telling it what it could do with its directions and casting aspersions on its parenthood. Lisa was doubled up with laughter which was causing her to cough up a lung.
“What?!” I asked her. “You don’t sense the hostility that is emanating from this witch? What does she have against Mass Ave anyway? Lisa agreed that the voice coming from the plastic box did seem to be getting testier as I continued to ignore its directions. And then suddenly, ominously, it stopped altogether.
“Oh, oh,” Lisa said. “I think she’s seriously pissed off at us now.”
Well, we made it to the doctor and then back to Somerville and I even made it home. I agreed with Madame G’s directions so she seemed to calm down and by the end of the trip we were buddies. So who knows, maybe we’ll travel together again sometime. After all, she does seem to be a woman who knows where she’s going. And that’s more than I can say for myself.
Saturday, June 27, 2009
Saturday, June 20, 2009
Fractionally Challenged
Fractionally Challenged
Back in the days when dinosaurs walked the earth I learned about fractions. I didn’t have any major problems with them. They made sense, mostly, and I added and subtracted without too much strain on my part. But aside from occasionally cutting a pie to feed a group, I hadn’t thought about them since. I mean, who does? Percentages are concepts that you use everyday but fractions tend to stay shyly in the background of our lives. So when I learned that I would have to teach them this year I was worried. Understanding a subject does not equate to teaching it well. We’ve all had genius professors who couldn’t teach their way out of a paper bag.
I was determined that my class would truly understand the concept because I’ve learned, through painful experience, that learning by rote doesn’t prepare you for the unexpected and never teaches you to think. I began my lesson planning with one of the best math teachers I know, my husband, Steve. But even he wasn’t sure which approach to use since my students had very little math experience and most of it was bad. But luckily the next day I discovered the toys that were hiding in my classroom closet.
There was an entire collection of colorful, magnetic, fraction pies, strips, blocks and squares, all illustrating the various ways you could divide a whole. I played with them, experimenting with the different ways to take them apart and put them back together, and knew that they would be the key to helping my class understand fractions. I excitedly planned two weeks of lesson plans but when I told my class that we would begin studying fractions the next week they looked like deer caught in the headlights.
“Oh God, fractions!” Deanna wailed. “I hate fractions, they’re evil!”
I tried to assure her that we would go slowly and then I showed her the toys that we would be playing with, but she was still skeptical. Toys, shmoys, fractions had never been fun and no magnetic pies would make them fun now. It was then that I got the idea to bring am apple pie to the first class so we could divide and eat at the same time. I would make them understand this even if it meant gaining weight in the process!
The best laid plans. That Friday I received a phone call from my director telling me that the Blackstone school and center would be closed the next week due to swine flu. Now you know that you’re nuts when, instead of being ecstatic at the thought of an unexpected week’s paid vacation, you immediately go into cranky mode. It was a matter of timing. I kept thinking of all the things that I had to finish by the end of the year, the lost math lessons and the fact that I would just plain miss going to work. I was also not thrilled at having to call my entire school to tell them not to come in the next week but to be sure and come back the week after. I just knew that thanks to this enforced time-out I would lose all my students for the rest of the year.
And I was right. On Monday five people showed up for class. It didn’t help that we also had that Wednesday off (the infamous Bunker Hill holiday) and that Thursday was graduation. Everyone just assumed that school was out for the summer. I wanted to scream, but what’s a girl to do? I decided to teach the damn fractions to whoever came in and hope that a few hours of instruction would stick with them all summer. I am ever the optimist.
Surprisingly most of my class showed up. Though I hadn’t brought my pie I was stupid enough to tell them about it. They kept ribbing me about the dessert that I owed them throughout the lesson. I promised to bring one next year. Then I took out all my colorful playthings, took a deep breath and began. First we talked about what they knew or remembered about fractions and how they used them everyday without thinking about it. I explained that it was just another form of division and that no matter how many pieces you cut a pie into, it was still one pie when you put it back together again, just like Humpty Dumpty.
We moved magnetic strips around the board, drew pictures, folded paper, shaded squares, we did everything but eat pie. And then in the middle of the lesson the most wonderful moment of my teaching career happened. Deanna, a big smile on her face, blurted out, “This is fun!” I nearly cried. And thank goodness my, glass-is-half-empty-self did not push itself to the front of the class and say, “Yeah well it’s fun now but wait till we start adding and dividing these suckers!” I simply smiled and enjoyed the moment.
There are times in life when beyond all reason everything is truly perfect. And that day in a South End, GED classroom, it was. I just hope that I can hold onto it for the cold February mornings when everyone is tired, cranky and determined not to learn a thing. I’ll take it out, dust it off and sprinkle it around like teaching fairy dust. And then maybe we’ll have some pie.
Back in the days when dinosaurs walked the earth I learned about fractions. I didn’t have any major problems with them. They made sense, mostly, and I added and subtracted without too much strain on my part. But aside from occasionally cutting a pie to feed a group, I hadn’t thought about them since. I mean, who does? Percentages are concepts that you use everyday but fractions tend to stay shyly in the background of our lives. So when I learned that I would have to teach them this year I was worried. Understanding a subject does not equate to teaching it well. We’ve all had genius professors who couldn’t teach their way out of a paper bag.
I was determined that my class would truly understand the concept because I’ve learned, through painful experience, that learning by rote doesn’t prepare you for the unexpected and never teaches you to think. I began my lesson planning with one of the best math teachers I know, my husband, Steve. But even he wasn’t sure which approach to use since my students had very little math experience and most of it was bad. But luckily the next day I discovered the toys that were hiding in my classroom closet.
There was an entire collection of colorful, magnetic, fraction pies, strips, blocks and squares, all illustrating the various ways you could divide a whole. I played with them, experimenting with the different ways to take them apart and put them back together, and knew that they would be the key to helping my class understand fractions. I excitedly planned two weeks of lesson plans but when I told my class that we would begin studying fractions the next week they looked like deer caught in the headlights.
“Oh God, fractions!” Deanna wailed. “I hate fractions, they’re evil!”
I tried to assure her that we would go slowly and then I showed her the toys that we would be playing with, but she was still skeptical. Toys, shmoys, fractions had never been fun and no magnetic pies would make them fun now. It was then that I got the idea to bring am apple pie to the first class so we could divide and eat at the same time. I would make them understand this even if it meant gaining weight in the process!
The best laid plans. That Friday I received a phone call from my director telling me that the Blackstone school and center would be closed the next week due to swine flu. Now you know that you’re nuts when, instead of being ecstatic at the thought of an unexpected week’s paid vacation, you immediately go into cranky mode. It was a matter of timing. I kept thinking of all the things that I had to finish by the end of the year, the lost math lessons and the fact that I would just plain miss going to work. I was also not thrilled at having to call my entire school to tell them not to come in the next week but to be sure and come back the week after. I just knew that thanks to this enforced time-out I would lose all my students for the rest of the year.
And I was right. On Monday five people showed up for class. It didn’t help that we also had that Wednesday off (the infamous Bunker Hill holiday) and that Thursday was graduation. Everyone just assumed that school was out for the summer. I wanted to scream, but what’s a girl to do? I decided to teach the damn fractions to whoever came in and hope that a few hours of instruction would stick with them all summer. I am ever the optimist.
Surprisingly most of my class showed up. Though I hadn’t brought my pie I was stupid enough to tell them about it. They kept ribbing me about the dessert that I owed them throughout the lesson. I promised to bring one next year. Then I took out all my colorful playthings, took a deep breath and began. First we talked about what they knew or remembered about fractions and how they used them everyday without thinking about it. I explained that it was just another form of division and that no matter how many pieces you cut a pie into, it was still one pie when you put it back together again, just like Humpty Dumpty.
We moved magnetic strips around the board, drew pictures, folded paper, shaded squares, we did everything but eat pie. And then in the middle of the lesson the most wonderful moment of my teaching career happened. Deanna, a big smile on her face, blurted out, “This is fun!” I nearly cried. And thank goodness my, glass-is-half-empty-self did not push itself to the front of the class and say, “Yeah well it’s fun now but wait till we start adding and dividing these suckers!” I simply smiled and enjoyed the moment.
There are times in life when beyond all reason everything is truly perfect. And that day in a South End, GED classroom, it was. I just hope that I can hold onto it for the cold February mornings when everyone is tired, cranky and determined not to learn a thing. I’ll take it out, dust it off and sprinkle it around like teaching fairy dust. And then maybe we’ll have some pie.
Sunday, June 14, 2009
Missing Filene's
Missing Filene’s
Bidding wars are big news around here lately. Two Boston institutions, The Globe and Filene’s Basement, are courting suitors to avoid sliding into oblivion. Though I was born in New York City I’ve lived here since 1976—long enough for me to feel like a native daughter and definitely long enough for these battles to feel personal. I can’t remember a morning that I did not read the Globe and as for Filene’s, well, it holds a special place in my transplanted, New England heart.
Steve and I were married in 1976. That summer my folks came to visit us in our North Shore apartment. Woburn was a bit of a shock for them. Mom and Dad had always gotten around by foot or public transportation and in Woburn that was a challenge. When they took a walk the neighbors would ask them what they were doing. No one walked in the suburbs—why bother when you’ve got a car? In desperation they asked us if there was any way for them to get into Boston by bus.
There actually was a T stop in front of our apartment complex and a schedule revealed that a bus came by about once an hour. That’s all my folks needed. The next day they were off. They came home that night telling us how they had walked around all day taking in the city sights. But the place that they enjoyed most was Filene’s Basement. They showed me a beautiful raincoat that they had bought for my dad and when they told me the price my jaw dropped. The next time they went, I went with them.
Dad, who was from Poland, pronounced Filene’s as “Fihlaine’s” and though at first I thought it was funny, I learned later that Filene’s was founded in 1881 by William Filene, a Jewish immigrant from Prussia who immigrated to Boston in 1848. I wondered if that wasn’t how Mr. Filene pronounced his name before the immigration officials changed it for him.
My first time in the Basement was love at first shop. The piles of stuff on the tables didn’t tempt me but I loved going through the racks. I also liked the fact that the clothing was not cheap seconds but good quality. That was due to the fact that Edward Filene had opened the automatic bargain annex, or basement, in 1908 as a way to sell excess, but still first class merchandise, from his upstairs department store. My dad’s tailor eye for fabric and workmanship helped me realize just how good the merchandise really was. And then there was the wonderful shopping moment when you looked at the ticket and saw the price. It was like hitting the lottery.
It took me a while though to get used to trying on clothes in the middle of the floor. The first time I saw a woman strip down to her underwear in the aisles I nearly passed out. But I caught on. I would wear leotards under my clothes on my shopping days and strip off with the best of them. I also learned to hold on to what I wanted.
One day as I was trying on a dress I put a skirt down next to me and before I could stand up a woman scooped it up and ran off with it. And even as I stood there flabbergasted another woman asked me if I was going to take the skirt that was draped over my arm or what? “I sure am!” I yelled at her, amazed at the predatory streak (and Boston accent) that had suddenly appeared. I didn’t even buy the skirt but I sure wasn’t going to give it to her! Then there were times when women would offer unsolicited fashion advice. You’d feel grateful until you realized that the reason she just told you that the skirt made you look fat was because she wanted it for herself. Ah the memories.
A large part of the pleasure of shopping the basement was that it was one-of-a-kind. It wasn’t a vanilla chain store that you could find in every mall in the U.S. It was crazy, unusual--each trip an adventure that you could regale your friends with later. Could you imagine a running-of-the-brides event at the GAP?
I know I’m prone to nostalgia but it saddens me that we lose originality each time another local business is bought out by a huge corporation. They call it progress. I call it laziness and a certain lack of courage. Why didn’t the Boston public protest Filene’s or Jordan Marsh’s closing like the resident’s of Chicago did when Marshall Field’s was closed in 2007? People there are still protesting. There is even a website, fieldsfanschicago.org, that organizes a boycott, leaflets, buttons, and publicizes polls taken by shoppers. Bostonians grieved for a bit but no one demanded that a piece of Boston’s history be revitalized. And now all we have is Macy’s. Is vanilla really our favorite flavor?
I’m tired of finding the same stores wherever I go. I travel to push myself out of my safe-zone. To find different, quirky, unique. And when I’m home I want to read my news with a Boston slant and shop stores that shout New England. I root for the Red Sox, pahk my cah and eat jimmies on my ice cream. That’s why I live here. I’m just not a Macy’s gal.
Bidding wars are big news around here lately. Two Boston institutions, The Globe and Filene’s Basement, are courting suitors to avoid sliding into oblivion. Though I was born in New York City I’ve lived here since 1976—long enough for me to feel like a native daughter and definitely long enough for these battles to feel personal. I can’t remember a morning that I did not read the Globe and as for Filene’s, well, it holds a special place in my transplanted, New England heart.
Steve and I were married in 1976. That summer my folks came to visit us in our North Shore apartment. Woburn was a bit of a shock for them. Mom and Dad had always gotten around by foot or public transportation and in Woburn that was a challenge. When they took a walk the neighbors would ask them what they were doing. No one walked in the suburbs—why bother when you’ve got a car? In desperation they asked us if there was any way for them to get into Boston by bus.
There actually was a T stop in front of our apartment complex and a schedule revealed that a bus came by about once an hour. That’s all my folks needed. The next day they were off. They came home that night telling us how they had walked around all day taking in the city sights. But the place that they enjoyed most was Filene’s Basement. They showed me a beautiful raincoat that they had bought for my dad and when they told me the price my jaw dropped. The next time they went, I went with them.
Dad, who was from Poland, pronounced Filene’s as “Fihlaine’s” and though at first I thought it was funny, I learned later that Filene’s was founded in 1881 by William Filene, a Jewish immigrant from Prussia who immigrated to Boston in 1848. I wondered if that wasn’t how Mr. Filene pronounced his name before the immigration officials changed it for him.
My first time in the Basement was love at first shop. The piles of stuff on the tables didn’t tempt me but I loved going through the racks. I also liked the fact that the clothing was not cheap seconds but good quality. That was due to the fact that Edward Filene had opened the automatic bargain annex, or basement, in 1908 as a way to sell excess, but still first class merchandise, from his upstairs department store. My dad’s tailor eye for fabric and workmanship helped me realize just how good the merchandise really was. And then there was the wonderful shopping moment when you looked at the ticket and saw the price. It was like hitting the lottery.
It took me a while though to get used to trying on clothes in the middle of the floor. The first time I saw a woman strip down to her underwear in the aisles I nearly passed out. But I caught on. I would wear leotards under my clothes on my shopping days and strip off with the best of them. I also learned to hold on to what I wanted.
One day as I was trying on a dress I put a skirt down next to me and before I could stand up a woman scooped it up and ran off with it. And even as I stood there flabbergasted another woman asked me if I was going to take the skirt that was draped over my arm or what? “I sure am!” I yelled at her, amazed at the predatory streak (and Boston accent) that had suddenly appeared. I didn’t even buy the skirt but I sure wasn’t going to give it to her! Then there were times when women would offer unsolicited fashion advice. You’d feel grateful until you realized that the reason she just told you that the skirt made you look fat was because she wanted it for herself. Ah the memories.
A large part of the pleasure of shopping the basement was that it was one-of-a-kind. It wasn’t a vanilla chain store that you could find in every mall in the U.S. It was crazy, unusual--each trip an adventure that you could regale your friends with later. Could you imagine a running-of-the-brides event at the GAP?
I know I’m prone to nostalgia but it saddens me that we lose originality each time another local business is bought out by a huge corporation. They call it progress. I call it laziness and a certain lack of courage. Why didn’t the Boston public protest Filene’s or Jordan Marsh’s closing like the resident’s of Chicago did when Marshall Field’s was closed in 2007? People there are still protesting. There is even a website, fieldsfanschicago.org, that organizes a boycott, leaflets, buttons, and publicizes polls taken by shoppers. Bostonians grieved for a bit but no one demanded that a piece of Boston’s history be revitalized. And now all we have is Macy’s. Is vanilla really our favorite flavor?
I’m tired of finding the same stores wherever I go. I travel to push myself out of my safe-zone. To find different, quirky, unique. And when I’m home I want to read my news with a Boston slant and shop stores that shout New England. I root for the Red Sox, pahk my cah and eat jimmies on my ice cream. That’s why I live here. I’m just not a Macy’s gal.
Wednesday, June 10, 2009
Pillow Talk
Pillow Talk
All I needed was a new pillow. What’s the big deal about buying a pillow? It’s not that I haven’t bought pillows before, but it was always for my family and none of them are pillow picky. So I guess the real problem was me because I didn’t want just any pillow, I wanted a foam pillow. I never thought that it would be an adventure.
When I was a child I had a never ending cough which got worse when I slept. Back in the fifties if a kid had my symptoms their tonsils were removed as a matter of course. Coughing? Can’t breathe? Constant colds? Yank out those tonsils. I don’t think that anyone in Brooklyn kept them beyond the age of five. I don’t remember much of my early childhood, but like Bill Cosby I still have vivid memories of my tonsils’ demise. I remember all the kids crying at the doctor’s clinic. I even remember my mom trying to wake me up and take me home. And I definitely remember that first swallow and the subsequent painful ones that even ice-cream couldn’t cure.
Once my tonsils were out the doctor told my mom to buy me a foam pillow and I’ve slept on one ever since. A girl gets used to a certain kind of pillow after all those years. That’s why I found myself in the Bed, Bath and Beyond the Known Universe emporium.
I used to walk in, grab a pillow and walk out. But in today’s brave new world there is no such thing as plain latex. Now there is something called memory foam. It’s ironic that while my memory has gone to hell my pillow will be the elephant of the bedding world. Plus these pillows are so heavy that it takes two people to lift them and they come in every shape but a rectangle. They are square, they are round they are wedge shaped and the best one of all—they are wavy. I kept staring at that one trying to figure out where exactly I was supposed to put my head. On the bump? The valley? On both at once? And then I saw the price. It was basically a down payment on a car.
I realized that they no longer manufactured my beloved plain foam pillow and that there was no way that I could afford one of these memory monsters. So after fifty years of pillow loyalty I silently bade my old friend farewell and began searching for a replacement. Easier said than done.
Thank goodness most pillows still come in the usual rectangular size, although they seem to have expanded to queen, king and emperor size. But their innards are a whole different matter. Do I want duck, chicken, ostrich or goose feathers? A combination of sorts? Maybe I’d rather sleep on one of the synthetic blends, which simulate the finest feathers but are hypo-sanitary. After all you never know where that goose has been. I think my favorite one was the all-natural synthetic blend. I felt like Alice down the rabbit hole.
Once I had chosen my preferred innards I had to decide how firm I wanted my pillow to be. As firm as a handshake? As soft as mashed potatoes? As middling as Jello? Then firmness decided, it was on to a choice based on yet another set of criteria—the way I slept: on my side, back or stomach. What if I sleep on all my sides in one night? Do I have to buy three separate pillows for each position? Do I then stack them by the side of my bed so that when I switch from my back to my stomach I’m ready to throw one pillow overboard and grab the next? Do I do this all night? I see nothing but troubling questions ahead with this system like, when do I sleep? Does an all in one sleeping pillow no longer exist? Can I strangle the idiot who came up with these ludicrous “improvements”?
Pillows are just the tip of the ice berg. You can’t buy a simple anything anymore. Last month Lisa needed to replace her cell phone. The first question the salesman asked was,
“What do you use your phone for? Texting? Music? E-mail? When Lisa shook her head at each option he was shocked.
“Oh, you use it just to talk?”
I’m confused. Isn’t that what phones are for?
Steve tells me that he’s constantly amazed at what has become of the simple one blade razor. One day, thanks to an amazing scientific breakthrough, there were suddenly two blades. If the first one missed a hair the second would immediately destroy it. Through the years the ante has been upped to six blades per razor. Does any man have enough hair on his face for six blades? Or does he enjoy the sensation of six blades efficiently shredding his skin?
And what ever happened to knobs? You know the small round things that you turned so that electronic stuff turned on and off and the volume went up and down? I miss knobs. Look around, there is no longer a simple anything that simply turns on does its job and then turns off. Bells and whistles are now mandatory. Oh well, at least I found a pillow. And thank God it has no remote control and no memory—just feathers.
All I needed was a new pillow. What’s the big deal about buying a pillow? It’s not that I haven’t bought pillows before, but it was always for my family and none of them are pillow picky. So I guess the real problem was me because I didn’t want just any pillow, I wanted a foam pillow. I never thought that it would be an adventure.
When I was a child I had a never ending cough which got worse when I slept. Back in the fifties if a kid had my symptoms their tonsils were removed as a matter of course. Coughing? Can’t breathe? Constant colds? Yank out those tonsils. I don’t think that anyone in Brooklyn kept them beyond the age of five. I don’t remember much of my early childhood, but like Bill Cosby I still have vivid memories of my tonsils’ demise. I remember all the kids crying at the doctor’s clinic. I even remember my mom trying to wake me up and take me home. And I definitely remember that first swallow and the subsequent painful ones that even ice-cream couldn’t cure.
Once my tonsils were out the doctor told my mom to buy me a foam pillow and I’ve slept on one ever since. A girl gets used to a certain kind of pillow after all those years. That’s why I found myself in the Bed, Bath and Beyond the Known Universe emporium.
I used to walk in, grab a pillow and walk out. But in today’s brave new world there is no such thing as plain latex. Now there is something called memory foam. It’s ironic that while my memory has gone to hell my pillow will be the elephant of the bedding world. Plus these pillows are so heavy that it takes two people to lift them and they come in every shape but a rectangle. They are square, they are round they are wedge shaped and the best one of all—they are wavy. I kept staring at that one trying to figure out where exactly I was supposed to put my head. On the bump? The valley? On both at once? And then I saw the price. It was basically a down payment on a car.
I realized that they no longer manufactured my beloved plain foam pillow and that there was no way that I could afford one of these memory monsters. So after fifty years of pillow loyalty I silently bade my old friend farewell and began searching for a replacement. Easier said than done.
Thank goodness most pillows still come in the usual rectangular size, although they seem to have expanded to queen, king and emperor size. But their innards are a whole different matter. Do I want duck, chicken, ostrich or goose feathers? A combination of sorts? Maybe I’d rather sleep on one of the synthetic blends, which simulate the finest feathers but are hypo-sanitary. After all you never know where that goose has been. I think my favorite one was the all-natural synthetic blend. I felt like Alice down the rabbit hole.
Once I had chosen my preferred innards I had to decide how firm I wanted my pillow to be. As firm as a handshake? As soft as mashed potatoes? As middling as Jello? Then firmness decided, it was on to a choice based on yet another set of criteria—the way I slept: on my side, back or stomach. What if I sleep on all my sides in one night? Do I have to buy three separate pillows for each position? Do I then stack them by the side of my bed so that when I switch from my back to my stomach I’m ready to throw one pillow overboard and grab the next? Do I do this all night? I see nothing but troubling questions ahead with this system like, when do I sleep? Does an all in one sleeping pillow no longer exist? Can I strangle the idiot who came up with these ludicrous “improvements”?
Pillows are just the tip of the ice berg. You can’t buy a simple anything anymore. Last month Lisa needed to replace her cell phone. The first question the salesman asked was,
“What do you use your phone for? Texting? Music? E-mail? When Lisa shook her head at each option he was shocked.
“Oh, you use it just to talk?”
I’m confused. Isn’t that what phones are for?
Steve tells me that he’s constantly amazed at what has become of the simple one blade razor. One day, thanks to an amazing scientific breakthrough, there were suddenly two blades. If the first one missed a hair the second would immediately destroy it. Through the years the ante has been upped to six blades per razor. Does any man have enough hair on his face for six blades? Or does he enjoy the sensation of six blades efficiently shredding his skin?
And what ever happened to knobs? You know the small round things that you turned so that electronic stuff turned on and off and the volume went up and down? I miss knobs. Look around, there is no longer a simple anything that simply turns on does its job and then turns off. Bells and whistles are now mandatory. Oh well, at least I found a pillow. And thank God it has no remote control and no memory—just feathers.
Things That Go Beep.....
Things That Go Beep in the Night
We were having dinner the other night when suddenly we both heard a beep. We stopped talking and looked at each other questioningly.
”Wonder what that is?” I said. But it was just a beep so we continued talking and eating and completely forgot about it until five minutes later when we heard another one.
“I think it’s coming from over there,” Steve said and pointed towards the far wall.”
“Well that narrows it down to a battery in the stove, the microwave or the timer,” I said.
At the third beep Steve went into computer programmer de-bugging mode, (that’s where you eliminate possibilities one by one until you are left with the only possible reason for an occurrence) determined to find from whence the offending beep came. The first thing that he did was put the kitchen timer on the table.
“Now if the timer beeps we’ll have solved the mystery,” he said.
“Brilliant Holmes,” I countered.
We continued our conversation occasionally giving the timer the fisheye. I felt pulled in three directions. I would prefer that it was the timer since that would be the easiest and cheapest thing to fix. However we’d had that dreary, brown microwave since Lisa was born, so I was not averse to getting a smaller, more brightly colored one. And as for the stove—I have never met a stove that was so hard to clean. I would be thrilled to part with it. But we couldn’t really afford a new one right now, so I pulled for the timer.
“BEEP!”
“Okay,” I said. “It’s not the timer. What now?”
Steve replied by getting up to unplug the microwave.
“You truly are a genius!” I told him.
Once again, on with dinner and conversation tinged with tension as we both eyed the microwave and the stove. I wondered whether I’d get a white or stainless steel microwave.
“BEEP!”
“Not the microwave!” we sang out in unison. But what could possibly be beeping on the stove? There were no batteries in it, its clock and timers ran on electricity. We began to clean up after dinner while keeping a close ear on the stove.
“BEEP!”
“It’s coming from the hall now!” Steve exclaimed. “And the only things out there are the smoke alarms,” he added as he disappeared into the hallway. So I mentally said good-bye to my new easy-to-clean stove and started on the dishes. Halfway through the glassware I began to wonder where my husband had gone. I went off to search and saw him sitting on the floor of Mariel’s room, scratching Snoopy’s ears.
“What the heck are you doing?!”
“I’m sitting here waiting to see if that darn smoke detector is the culprit!”
The only one who was happy at that point was Snoopy, who was blatantly taking advantage of the situation by lying there in the sheer ecstasy of having his ears unexpectedly scratched.
Seeing the look on my face Steve quickly got up to help me finish the dishes. Suddenly I had an epiphany.
“You know it sounds just like my cell phone when I’ve missed a call.” I barely finished the sentence when we both looked at my bag hanging on the chair near my desk.
“Oh no!” I laughed as I ran to pull the phone out of my bag only to see that I had indeed missed a call from Lisa. I turned around to face a husband who would have gladly tossed the phone (and possibly me) out of the window.
“It would have driven me insane all night!” he roared. “That’s another reason why I hate cell phones!” Somehow the sight of all that righteous indignation over a little bleeping phone triggered my funny bone and I doubled over laughing hysterically. I tried to leave a message for Lisa but all I could manage were gasps and chortles, as I told Lisa that I would have to explain later about her dad, the techie, who hates hi tech phones. I’m surprised that we don’t still have an old rotary job sitting on the hall table.
But the funniest thing about this little comic scenario was that we had already played it out about a year ago. My phone had been beeping merrily away in the bedroom closet one evening, while we desperately tried to find out where the noise was coming from. When I finally figured it out I had told Steve, “Well now at least we’ll know what it is if it happens again!” The problem is that neither one of us uses our cell phones very often (Steve will use his only in case of pestilence and nuclear war) and so not too many people leave messages on our phones. The other problem is that there are just too many things in our lives that emit the same annoying, BEEP!
Why can’t we personalize our household beeps the way we do ring tones? That way we would know immediately what appliance is trying to catch our attention. If we heard, Eine Kleine Nachtmusik we would think,”Ah Mozart, it must be the microwave.” Wagner’s Ride of the Valkyries could herald a problem with the smoke detectors. I would mention my idea to Steve but I think he might suggest what I could beeping do with my idea. Poor dear. He takes these things too much to heart.
We were having dinner the other night when suddenly we both heard a beep. We stopped talking and looked at each other questioningly.
”Wonder what that is?” I said. But it was just a beep so we continued talking and eating and completely forgot about it until five minutes later when we heard another one.
“I think it’s coming from over there,” Steve said and pointed towards the far wall.”
“Well that narrows it down to a battery in the stove, the microwave or the timer,” I said.
At the third beep Steve went into computer programmer de-bugging mode, (that’s where you eliminate possibilities one by one until you are left with the only possible reason for an occurrence) determined to find from whence the offending beep came. The first thing that he did was put the kitchen timer on the table.
“Now if the timer beeps we’ll have solved the mystery,” he said.
“Brilliant Holmes,” I countered.
We continued our conversation occasionally giving the timer the fisheye. I felt pulled in three directions. I would prefer that it was the timer since that would be the easiest and cheapest thing to fix. However we’d had that dreary, brown microwave since Lisa was born, so I was not averse to getting a smaller, more brightly colored one. And as for the stove—I have never met a stove that was so hard to clean. I would be thrilled to part with it. But we couldn’t really afford a new one right now, so I pulled for the timer.
“BEEP!”
“Okay,” I said. “It’s not the timer. What now?”
Steve replied by getting up to unplug the microwave.
“You truly are a genius!” I told him.
Once again, on with dinner and conversation tinged with tension as we both eyed the microwave and the stove. I wondered whether I’d get a white or stainless steel microwave.
“BEEP!”
“Not the microwave!” we sang out in unison. But what could possibly be beeping on the stove? There were no batteries in it, its clock and timers ran on electricity. We began to clean up after dinner while keeping a close ear on the stove.
“BEEP!”
“It’s coming from the hall now!” Steve exclaimed. “And the only things out there are the smoke alarms,” he added as he disappeared into the hallway. So I mentally said good-bye to my new easy-to-clean stove and started on the dishes. Halfway through the glassware I began to wonder where my husband had gone. I went off to search and saw him sitting on the floor of Mariel’s room, scratching Snoopy’s ears.
“What the heck are you doing?!”
“I’m sitting here waiting to see if that darn smoke detector is the culprit!”
The only one who was happy at that point was Snoopy, who was blatantly taking advantage of the situation by lying there in the sheer ecstasy of having his ears unexpectedly scratched.
Seeing the look on my face Steve quickly got up to help me finish the dishes. Suddenly I had an epiphany.
“You know it sounds just like my cell phone when I’ve missed a call.” I barely finished the sentence when we both looked at my bag hanging on the chair near my desk.
“Oh no!” I laughed as I ran to pull the phone out of my bag only to see that I had indeed missed a call from Lisa. I turned around to face a husband who would have gladly tossed the phone (and possibly me) out of the window.
“It would have driven me insane all night!” he roared. “That’s another reason why I hate cell phones!” Somehow the sight of all that righteous indignation over a little bleeping phone triggered my funny bone and I doubled over laughing hysterically. I tried to leave a message for Lisa but all I could manage were gasps and chortles, as I told Lisa that I would have to explain later about her dad, the techie, who hates hi tech phones. I’m surprised that we don’t still have an old rotary job sitting on the hall table.
But the funniest thing about this little comic scenario was that we had already played it out about a year ago. My phone had been beeping merrily away in the bedroom closet one evening, while we desperately tried to find out where the noise was coming from. When I finally figured it out I had told Steve, “Well now at least we’ll know what it is if it happens again!” The problem is that neither one of us uses our cell phones very often (Steve will use his only in case of pestilence and nuclear war) and so not too many people leave messages on our phones. The other problem is that there are just too many things in our lives that emit the same annoying, BEEP!
Why can’t we personalize our household beeps the way we do ring tones? That way we would know immediately what appliance is trying to catch our attention. If we heard, Eine Kleine Nachtmusik we would think,”Ah Mozart, it must be the microwave.” Wagner’s Ride of the Valkyries could herald a problem with the smoke detectors. I would mention my idea to Steve but I think he might suggest what I could beeping do with my idea. Poor dear. He takes these things too much to heart.
Whirlwind
Whirlwind
A month has disappeared. May was here and now it’s gone. And though this happens every year this May’s disappearance is especially missed since it took Lisa and Mariel with it. April 30th Lisa walked off a plane from India and into our arms and before we could exhale she walked right out and back to her own life again. As I keep telling my daughters, “Why can’t you guys just rotten up so that I’ll be happy when you leave?!” But they refuse to cooperate and keep on being the lovely young ladies that they are. What’s a mother to do?
I remember thinking during the last few weeks that Lisa was in India, “Soon she’ll be home for a whole month—enjoy every second.” Easier thought than actually done. Everyday life kept getting in the way of the moment and I let it. It’s easy to be in-the-moment when you’re on vacation. Up till now I was always home when the girls came back for vacation. But this time around I was working, so it made for some interesting times.
Mariel says that the way you know that Lisa is home is that the floor of her room disappears. When Lisa left in November I managed to cram her clothing into her closet and drawers. Since there was barely room for a toothpick I wondered how she was going to fit in all the stuff she would inevitably buy. The answer was simple: she couldn’t. It all ended up in piles on her floor. Poor Snoopy would stand on the threshold of her room, gaze wistfully at her bed, then gingerly tip toe in and around the piles till he reached it. It was a virtuoso performance.
The pile also grew on the bathroom vanity. Every time I walked in I noticed something new had been added. After a while I gave up trying to clean under the stuff and would just go around everything. And every time I would say to myself, “You’re going to miss this when she’s gone, you know you will.” But that’s hard to visualize when you’ve just come home from work exhausted.
Then came the day of laundry. One rainy day three weeks after Lisa had come home, there was so much clothing hanging in the bathroom that it took on all the chic ambiance of a commercial laundry. It turned out that Lisa had just gotten around to unpacking her bag and had decided to wash everything. I prayed that the washer and dryer would make it through the day. Miraculously they’ve been running since 1989 and I keep waiting for them to break down in the middle of a wash cycle. So I tend to get nervous when the washer decides to conga across the room. Somehow though, that day was not a good day for it to die, and it survived to wash another day.
Our life became truly interesting when Mariel came for a long week-end, forcing us to figure out schedules for four people with two cars. Mariel had appointments in various places, Lisa had plans in the city and I had to get to work. Steve became the official Schottenfeld chauffeur.
For the past few months Steve has been working from home starting his own business. On a usual day he doesn’t emerge from his downstairs office until it’s time to pick me up. But with two daughters needing to be taken hither and yon he kissed his work schedule good-bye. I would come home and see my husband with a strange glazed expression in his eyes and know that the question, “So what did you do today?” would not be a welcome one. One evening we spent half an hour at the dinner table writing out a schedule of pick-ups and drop-offs that would have impressed the British secret service. It was a masterpiece. I was just glad that it wasn’t me who was driving it.
And then, at the end of that day, we had to prepare dinner for a guest that Lisa had invited, her old room mate Pria. Pria’s parents had treated Lisa like a queen when she visited them in India. I wanted to do the same for Pria but since she was a strict vegetarian, it was Lisa who had to cook dinner. So I came home to a scene that any restaurant chef would be proud of, but that simply exhausted me—Lisa cutting, chopping and mixing in every dish in the house, while Mariel was baking on the dining room table. I took one look at the piles of pots, pans and dishes and poured myself a glass of wine.
The evening was wonderful. The food was so good I licked my fingers, the dessert divine, the conversation fascinating and just plain fun. We didn’t want Pria to go home but we were all so exhausted that we had to.
And now, of course, the girls are gone, and so is the clutter, the craziness, the fun and the laughter. Steve and I have returned to our safe, sane, boring schedule. And Snoopy and I stand at the threshold of two bedrooms, gazing in, despondent, able to easily enter and yet not wanting to. Unfortunately now we have all the time in the world to live in-the-moment and the moment is so lonely. I told me so.
A month has disappeared. May was here and now it’s gone. And though this happens every year this May’s disappearance is especially missed since it took Lisa and Mariel with it. April 30th Lisa walked off a plane from India and into our arms and before we could exhale she walked right out and back to her own life again. As I keep telling my daughters, “Why can’t you guys just rotten up so that I’ll be happy when you leave?!” But they refuse to cooperate and keep on being the lovely young ladies that they are. What’s a mother to do?
I remember thinking during the last few weeks that Lisa was in India, “Soon she’ll be home for a whole month—enjoy every second.” Easier thought than actually done. Everyday life kept getting in the way of the moment and I let it. It’s easy to be in-the-moment when you’re on vacation. Up till now I was always home when the girls came back for vacation. But this time around I was working, so it made for some interesting times.
Mariel says that the way you know that Lisa is home is that the floor of her room disappears. When Lisa left in November I managed to cram her clothing into her closet and drawers. Since there was barely room for a toothpick I wondered how she was going to fit in all the stuff she would inevitably buy. The answer was simple: she couldn’t. It all ended up in piles on her floor. Poor Snoopy would stand on the threshold of her room, gaze wistfully at her bed, then gingerly tip toe in and around the piles till he reached it. It was a virtuoso performance.
The pile also grew on the bathroom vanity. Every time I walked in I noticed something new had been added. After a while I gave up trying to clean under the stuff and would just go around everything. And every time I would say to myself, “You’re going to miss this when she’s gone, you know you will.” But that’s hard to visualize when you’ve just come home from work exhausted.
Then came the day of laundry. One rainy day three weeks after Lisa had come home, there was so much clothing hanging in the bathroom that it took on all the chic ambiance of a commercial laundry. It turned out that Lisa had just gotten around to unpacking her bag and had decided to wash everything. I prayed that the washer and dryer would make it through the day. Miraculously they’ve been running since 1989 and I keep waiting for them to break down in the middle of a wash cycle. So I tend to get nervous when the washer decides to conga across the room. Somehow though, that day was not a good day for it to die, and it survived to wash another day.
Our life became truly interesting when Mariel came for a long week-end, forcing us to figure out schedules for four people with two cars. Mariel had appointments in various places, Lisa had plans in the city and I had to get to work. Steve became the official Schottenfeld chauffeur.
For the past few months Steve has been working from home starting his own business. On a usual day he doesn’t emerge from his downstairs office until it’s time to pick me up. But with two daughters needing to be taken hither and yon he kissed his work schedule good-bye. I would come home and see my husband with a strange glazed expression in his eyes and know that the question, “So what did you do today?” would not be a welcome one. One evening we spent half an hour at the dinner table writing out a schedule of pick-ups and drop-offs that would have impressed the British secret service. It was a masterpiece. I was just glad that it wasn’t me who was driving it.
And then, at the end of that day, we had to prepare dinner for a guest that Lisa had invited, her old room mate Pria. Pria’s parents had treated Lisa like a queen when she visited them in India. I wanted to do the same for Pria but since she was a strict vegetarian, it was Lisa who had to cook dinner. So I came home to a scene that any restaurant chef would be proud of, but that simply exhausted me—Lisa cutting, chopping and mixing in every dish in the house, while Mariel was baking on the dining room table. I took one look at the piles of pots, pans and dishes and poured myself a glass of wine.
The evening was wonderful. The food was so good I licked my fingers, the dessert divine, the conversation fascinating and just plain fun. We didn’t want Pria to go home but we were all so exhausted that we had to.
And now, of course, the girls are gone, and so is the clutter, the craziness, the fun and the laughter. Steve and I have returned to our safe, sane, boring schedule. And Snoopy and I stand at the threshold of two bedrooms, gazing in, despondent, able to easily enter and yet not wanting to. Unfortunately now we have all the time in the world to live in-the-moment and the moment is so lonely. I told me so.
Great Expectations
Great Expectations
Mariel was graduating from UMass Amherst and I was expecting it to be unforgettable. Having finally accepted the fact that my baby had finished college, I was planning the logistics of the day. In true Schottenfeld form we had neglected to make hotel reservations early enough and so it was going to be a day trip. I thought I would at least make dinner reservations for us but the reservation gods were not smiling on us. Then I had an inspiration—I would order sandwiches and salads from our favorite neighborhood store and bring the entire celebratory lunch up in a cooler.
I was feeling proud of myself until Mariel handed us an invitation to UMass’s Commonwealth College graduation. Commonwealth, or CommColl as everyone calls it, was created ten years ago as a separate honors school in the University that offered its students intense courses, personal advisors and even separate housing. Now I learned that it was also holding a separate graduation. CommColl’s ceremonies would start at 9:00 and end at about 10:30. That meant that we would have to leave the house at 6:00 a.m. to get there in time to park and get a decent seat. So who needed sleep anyway?
Commencement for the entire school started at 12:30. That meant we would have at least two hours between ceremonies, which seemed fine at the time. But later on when we read Mariel’s instruction packet we learned that the graduates had to be at the football stadium at 11:30, so we were down to one hour. What about eating? The packet went on to explain that there would be food available everywhere, so not to worry. And for once I didn’t.
The weather forecast was for a cool, cloudy day with possible showers. So I decided to wear a pants suit and take umbrellas. We left the house and set off to watch our baby graduate. We got there in plenty of time to park and settle into the seats that Lisa and Mariel’s boyfriend, Dan had saved for us. Sitting comfortably in my soft seat I looked around at the Mullins Center and thought how perfect everything looked—there were flowers beneath the stage, banners hanging from the rafters—it was truly lovely. Exactly what a graduation should look like.
And then the CommColl graduates came marching in, grouped in their schools, behind students carrying large banners. We saw Mariel and did the usual loud family wave and shout. We listened to the speakers talk about the college and our brilliant children and when the president told them to stand, face their parents and give them a round of applause, I could feel my eyes become wet.
And then we waited for Mariel’s school to be called and waited again for her name and when we finally heard it and saw her walk up to get her gold CommColl tassel, we yelled and screamed and completely embarrassed her and ourselves. And when I sat down I could feel tears but I didn’t care. This is what graduations are about: Pride, happiness and bittersweet memories.
And then the day took a nosedive. Mariel had to sprint over to the football field to be there by 11:30 and we had to find something to eat. The day had turned sunny and warm and my pants suit was suddenly not such a great idea, especially after we decided to walk to the stadium instead of getting on a packed shuttle bus. When we finally got there we were all starving so we looked around for all the promised food vendors. All we saw were kiosks selling hotdogs, greasy pizza, muffins and soda. I plunked down $17.00 for a pathetic snack.
The ceremony was supposed to start at 12:30 so at 11:45 we walked over to the stadium. We entered one of the doors and stopped. The place was packed. Standing there with the sun beating down on my head I felt faint. There was absolutely no place left to sit in that huge coliseum. We looked at each other wondering what to do. But there wasn’t anything we could do except leave. When we were outside Dan told us that he was going back in. He thought that he might be able to find a single seat. “Great!” I told him. “At least one of us should be in there to watch Mariel officially graduate.
Steve, Lisa and I trudged across the street and plopped down under a tree. I couldn’t believe that we weren’t inside. As we sat we saw bus after bus packed with people still arriving. I had no idea how those people were going to get in. Afterwards Dan told us that they put out folding chairs. The only problem was that he couldn’t see a thing, so he dozed.
When Mariel came out I apologized like a mad woman, but she hugged me and laughed. “You just missed a bunch of boring speeches,” she said. I knew she was right and I knew that we had had our graduation earlier that morning but somehow I still felt cheated.
Later that week, Mariel sent us a link to the UMass graduation site. Out of the 7,000 students at commencement the photographer had snapped a photo of her about to move the tassel on her cap. What are the odds? Somehow that photo made up for my disappointment. There she was--my girl, smiling, beautiful and graduated.
Mariel was graduating from UMass Amherst and I was expecting it to be unforgettable. Having finally accepted the fact that my baby had finished college, I was planning the logistics of the day. In true Schottenfeld form we had neglected to make hotel reservations early enough and so it was going to be a day trip. I thought I would at least make dinner reservations for us but the reservation gods were not smiling on us. Then I had an inspiration—I would order sandwiches and salads from our favorite neighborhood store and bring the entire celebratory lunch up in a cooler.
I was feeling proud of myself until Mariel handed us an invitation to UMass’s Commonwealth College graduation. Commonwealth, or CommColl as everyone calls it, was created ten years ago as a separate honors school in the University that offered its students intense courses, personal advisors and even separate housing. Now I learned that it was also holding a separate graduation. CommColl’s ceremonies would start at 9:00 and end at about 10:30. That meant that we would have to leave the house at 6:00 a.m. to get there in time to park and get a decent seat. So who needed sleep anyway?
Commencement for the entire school started at 12:30. That meant we would have at least two hours between ceremonies, which seemed fine at the time. But later on when we read Mariel’s instruction packet we learned that the graduates had to be at the football stadium at 11:30, so we were down to one hour. What about eating? The packet went on to explain that there would be food available everywhere, so not to worry. And for once I didn’t.
The weather forecast was for a cool, cloudy day with possible showers. So I decided to wear a pants suit and take umbrellas. We left the house and set off to watch our baby graduate. We got there in plenty of time to park and settle into the seats that Lisa and Mariel’s boyfriend, Dan had saved for us. Sitting comfortably in my soft seat I looked around at the Mullins Center and thought how perfect everything looked—there were flowers beneath the stage, banners hanging from the rafters—it was truly lovely. Exactly what a graduation should look like.
And then the CommColl graduates came marching in, grouped in their schools, behind students carrying large banners. We saw Mariel and did the usual loud family wave and shout. We listened to the speakers talk about the college and our brilliant children and when the president told them to stand, face their parents and give them a round of applause, I could feel my eyes become wet.
And then we waited for Mariel’s school to be called and waited again for her name and when we finally heard it and saw her walk up to get her gold CommColl tassel, we yelled and screamed and completely embarrassed her and ourselves. And when I sat down I could feel tears but I didn’t care. This is what graduations are about: Pride, happiness and bittersweet memories.
And then the day took a nosedive. Mariel had to sprint over to the football field to be there by 11:30 and we had to find something to eat. The day had turned sunny and warm and my pants suit was suddenly not such a great idea, especially after we decided to walk to the stadium instead of getting on a packed shuttle bus. When we finally got there we were all starving so we looked around for all the promised food vendors. All we saw were kiosks selling hotdogs, greasy pizza, muffins and soda. I plunked down $17.00 for a pathetic snack.
The ceremony was supposed to start at 12:30 so at 11:45 we walked over to the stadium. We entered one of the doors and stopped. The place was packed. Standing there with the sun beating down on my head I felt faint. There was absolutely no place left to sit in that huge coliseum. We looked at each other wondering what to do. But there wasn’t anything we could do except leave. When we were outside Dan told us that he was going back in. He thought that he might be able to find a single seat. “Great!” I told him. “At least one of us should be in there to watch Mariel officially graduate.
Steve, Lisa and I trudged across the street and plopped down under a tree. I couldn’t believe that we weren’t inside. As we sat we saw bus after bus packed with people still arriving. I had no idea how those people were going to get in. Afterwards Dan told us that they put out folding chairs. The only problem was that he couldn’t see a thing, so he dozed.
When Mariel came out I apologized like a mad woman, but she hugged me and laughed. “You just missed a bunch of boring speeches,” she said. I knew she was right and I knew that we had had our graduation earlier that morning but somehow I still felt cheated.
Later that week, Mariel sent us a link to the UMass graduation site. Out of the 7,000 students at commencement the photographer had snapped a photo of her about to move the tassel on her cap. What are the odds? Somehow that photo made up for my disappointment. There she was--my girl, smiling, beautiful and graduated.
The World On A Swing
I’ve Got the World On a Swing
Last week Beverly Beckham led me back to my childhood. As I read her memories of a perfect spring, childhood day, I recognized her words as long lost friends, because for me it’s the sight of a swing that immediately takes me back to all the swings I’ve ever dreamed on.
The swings of my childhood were made of metal: the seats that would burn the backs of your legs on a hot day if you sat down too quickly (and of course you always did), and the chains that attached them to the bar above. Almost everything in the playground was metal: the monkey bars, the slides, the roundabout--only the seesaw was made of wood that always splintered in your hands. There were no rubber mats on the ground, just dirt or concrete, and if you came down too quickly on the slide or slipped off the monkey bars, it really hurt. And we won’t even talk about the pain when your partner got up too quickly from the seesaw.
Although I loved the fast rush of the slide and could never wait to get to the top of the monkey bars, the swings were my real love. I remember begging my mom for one more push and watching her enviously when she sat on the swing next to mine and propelled herself to the top. When I finally learned to pump it was my first sweet taste of freedom. I would always try to go higher and higher until the swing would almost go around the top bar scaring me happily to death. When I grew tired I would get myself to the very top then hang my head back and watch the clouds go back and forth, back and forth. The world looked wonderful up side down.
When we traveled to upstate New York for the summers, I would start my days on the swings. It was our group’s gathering place where we decided whether to go swimming or spend the afternoon in the woods looking for frogs and salamanders. Sometimes we played tag and ring-o-leevio and red-light-green-light but I would always stop for a quick swing.
Later on when we moved to Coney Island there was a park near the boardwalk called Sea Breeze Park. The best part of it was the small playground that had metal swings. Whenever I would go for a walk with a boyfriend I would head straight for them. I had two questions for potential boyfriends: were they willing to take me ice-skating on Friday nights and did they enjoy swings? Shatz passed both tests easily. Even though he didn’t like ice skating because of his weak ankles, he took me because I enjoyed it. And even though swings made him queasy, he enjoyed watching me love them. And even though I was 17 and not 7, I still did.
I still loved being given that first push, then pumping myself up as high as I dared. It felt reckless and daring and the closest thing to flying that I could have. Shatz would sit and watch me, usually begging me to come down and then we would sit together and talk about school, life and us.
He proposed to me on a swing. Not on a Brooklyn swing but out in the heartland of an Indiana campground. We were on our way home from a four week, cross- country, driving trip and had pitched our tent for the night on this razor straight, numbingly boring field. It was quite a come down from the sites we had stayed at in the Colorado mountains. But at the edge of the field there was a set of rusty, sorry looking swings, and I headed for them at the end of the day.
We sat and talked about the trip and how I would be going back to Israel soon and what were we going to do, how would we manage without seeing each other everyday? How would we ever get back together once I left? And then suddenly I heard him asking me to marry him and the world tilted a bit. And I realized that even though I had no idea how we would work it out, the only answer I could give him was yes.
So many years later, Steve and I took Lisa to her first playground and her first swing. The swings were no longer metal, but rubber hammock like contraptions and even the chains were coated in rubber for safety. Steve strapped her in and began pushing her gently all the while asking, “Do you want me to push you higher?” And she laughed out loud and shouted, “Yes!” and then laughed again as she went a bit higher.
I found that I couldn’t just stand there and watch, I had to try it strange as that rubber swing looked. But when I sat down it felt like a kind of straight jacket and I could barely stick my feet out to pump. But I managed and soon enough I was high enough to scare even myself. When I looked down I could see the amazement in Lisa’s eyes. When I stopped pumping and came back down, she looked at Steve and yelled, “Push me like mommy!” My girl. Like her mom she had the world on a swing.
Last week Beverly Beckham led me back to my childhood. As I read her memories of a perfect spring, childhood day, I recognized her words as long lost friends, because for me it’s the sight of a swing that immediately takes me back to all the swings I’ve ever dreamed on.
The swings of my childhood were made of metal: the seats that would burn the backs of your legs on a hot day if you sat down too quickly (and of course you always did), and the chains that attached them to the bar above. Almost everything in the playground was metal: the monkey bars, the slides, the roundabout--only the seesaw was made of wood that always splintered in your hands. There were no rubber mats on the ground, just dirt or concrete, and if you came down too quickly on the slide or slipped off the monkey bars, it really hurt. And we won’t even talk about the pain when your partner got up too quickly from the seesaw.
Although I loved the fast rush of the slide and could never wait to get to the top of the monkey bars, the swings were my real love. I remember begging my mom for one more push and watching her enviously when she sat on the swing next to mine and propelled herself to the top. When I finally learned to pump it was my first sweet taste of freedom. I would always try to go higher and higher until the swing would almost go around the top bar scaring me happily to death. When I grew tired I would get myself to the very top then hang my head back and watch the clouds go back and forth, back and forth. The world looked wonderful up side down.
When we traveled to upstate New York for the summers, I would start my days on the swings. It was our group’s gathering place where we decided whether to go swimming or spend the afternoon in the woods looking for frogs and salamanders. Sometimes we played tag and ring-o-leevio and red-light-green-light but I would always stop for a quick swing.
Later on when we moved to Coney Island there was a park near the boardwalk called Sea Breeze Park. The best part of it was the small playground that had metal swings. Whenever I would go for a walk with a boyfriend I would head straight for them. I had two questions for potential boyfriends: were they willing to take me ice-skating on Friday nights and did they enjoy swings? Shatz passed both tests easily. Even though he didn’t like ice skating because of his weak ankles, he took me because I enjoyed it. And even though swings made him queasy, he enjoyed watching me love them. And even though I was 17 and not 7, I still did.
I still loved being given that first push, then pumping myself up as high as I dared. It felt reckless and daring and the closest thing to flying that I could have. Shatz would sit and watch me, usually begging me to come down and then we would sit together and talk about school, life and us.
He proposed to me on a swing. Not on a Brooklyn swing but out in the heartland of an Indiana campground. We were on our way home from a four week, cross- country, driving trip and had pitched our tent for the night on this razor straight, numbingly boring field. It was quite a come down from the sites we had stayed at in the Colorado mountains. But at the edge of the field there was a set of rusty, sorry looking swings, and I headed for them at the end of the day.
We sat and talked about the trip and how I would be going back to Israel soon and what were we going to do, how would we manage without seeing each other everyday? How would we ever get back together once I left? And then suddenly I heard him asking me to marry him and the world tilted a bit. And I realized that even though I had no idea how we would work it out, the only answer I could give him was yes.
So many years later, Steve and I took Lisa to her first playground and her first swing. The swings were no longer metal, but rubber hammock like contraptions and even the chains were coated in rubber for safety. Steve strapped her in and began pushing her gently all the while asking, “Do you want me to push you higher?” And she laughed out loud and shouted, “Yes!” and then laughed again as she went a bit higher.
I found that I couldn’t just stand there and watch, I had to try it strange as that rubber swing looked. But when I sat down it felt like a kind of straight jacket and I could barely stick my feet out to pump. But I managed and soon enough I was high enough to scare even myself. When I looked down I could see the amazement in Lisa’s eyes. When I stopped pumping and came back down, she looked at Steve and yelled, “Push me like mommy!” My girl. Like her mom she had the world on a swing.
Coney Island Dreams
Coney Island Dreams
Little did my friend Roxy know that it wasn’t just a magazine that she gave me to read last Saturday, but a recurring nostalgic day dream. She was just being her usual thoughtful self, passing on an article about my old neighborhood. But it takes very little for me to begin thinking of Coney Island and that article was a treasure cave of Coney Island delights of the mind. (My profound apologies to Ferlinghetti)
Though I always say that I grew up in Coney Island it’s not 100% true. We didn’t move there until I was twelve so I had already done a fair amount of growing and secondly our apartment wasn’t actually in Coney Island, but near it. But though I only lived in the neighborhood for eight years, all of my growing up memories begin and end there. And the Wonderwheel, the Cyclone and the Parachute Jump dominated my bedroom window, lighting up my summer nights. Growing up in their honky tonk shadow was grand.
Living just blocks away from the beach, the boardwalk, and an amusement park had to be the best childhood a kid could have. At the first warm hint of summer I could grab my blanket, suntan lotion and a couple of friends and head for the boardwalk. It was heaven, sheer adolescent heaven.
Now as I read that Coney Island’s days are numbered, destined to become yet another condo heaven, I feel as if I should get myself back down there before they destroy everything that I remember. And there is so very much. I remember my first glimpse of Brighton Beach bliss when we first moved to the area. Mom and I had just gotten off at the Ocean Parkway stop of the D train and we stood there transfixed at the sight of the ocean. The ocean was an hour’s travel and another world from the Eastern Parkway neighborhood that we had just come from. We had entered the subway from a baked-hot June street and emerged to an ocean breeze. And then later on, standing on the terrace of our apartment, I had my first glimpse of our Cyclone-Wonderwheel view and I was star struck.
Though I grew everyday accustomed to the view, I never tired of it. I would sit sleepless at my window at three in the morning, gazing at the lights of the turning Wonderwheel, listening to the distant sounds of people having a good time. I even remember the smell of the hotdogs mixed with popcorn and cotton candy. Though there was always plenty of junk food to indulge in, we locals stuck to Nathan’s Famous hotdogs and french fries, the grease saturating the cardboard containers they were served in, ketchup dripping down the sides.
The cotton candy vendors never stopped spinning and the ice cream came hard and soft serve. I think that you could search from one end of the boardwalk to the other and never find a single place that sold “healthy” food. It was all glorious junk and we licked our fingers without worrying about calories.
One afternoon Steve and I planned to go on some of the rides and then stop at Nathan’s for lunch. We decided to try a new ride in Astroland. It consisted of two cars suspended on long metal rods that turned around a central base, passing each other as they spun round and round from the ground to the air and back to the ground like the hands of some demented clock. Add to that the fact that as you were up in the air you were upside down and that made it downright horrifying. Scared as I was I still screamed delightedly, not realizing that Shatz had grown quieter as the ride went on. Years later, when Lisa and Mariel came along, I would learn that silence on a ride was not a good sign.
Finally it stopped and we staggered out. I babbled on about how wild the ride was and still Steve was quiet. Suddenly I realized how silent he was and looked over to see the strangest expression on his face, in fact I could have sworn he had turned green. I managed to get him over to a bench and after a few minutes he told me that he had never felt so nauseous in his life. It was then that we learned that he could do rides that went up and down and sometimes round and round but never upside down. After a while I looked over at my poor sick boyfriend and said, “I guess this means we won’t be going to Nathan’s?”
We last visited Coney Island when Lisa and Mariel were kids. Even then we saw signs of gentrification creeping into our adolescent playground. The streets were clean, there was no longer an “under the boardwalk” since they had filled the underside with sand, and a volleyball tournament was taking place on the beach. Volleyball in Coney Island--right then we knew that the end was near.
And now a New York Real Estate Company has bought nearly three quarters of the land around the amusement park and plans to build condos and a glitzy new batch of whitewashed amusements ala Disney. The earthy uniqueness, the gritty, sand-between-your-toes, grease-on-your-fingers-deliciousness will be gone leaving just a wisp of regret and the smoke of nostalgia-aching dreams.
Little did my friend Roxy know that it wasn’t just a magazine that she gave me to read last Saturday, but a recurring nostalgic day dream. She was just being her usual thoughtful self, passing on an article about my old neighborhood. But it takes very little for me to begin thinking of Coney Island and that article was a treasure cave of Coney Island delights of the mind. (My profound apologies to Ferlinghetti)
Though I always say that I grew up in Coney Island it’s not 100% true. We didn’t move there until I was twelve so I had already done a fair amount of growing and secondly our apartment wasn’t actually in Coney Island, but near it. But though I only lived in the neighborhood for eight years, all of my growing up memories begin and end there. And the Wonderwheel, the Cyclone and the Parachute Jump dominated my bedroom window, lighting up my summer nights. Growing up in their honky tonk shadow was grand.
Living just blocks away from the beach, the boardwalk, and an amusement park had to be the best childhood a kid could have. At the first warm hint of summer I could grab my blanket, suntan lotion and a couple of friends and head for the boardwalk. It was heaven, sheer adolescent heaven.
Now as I read that Coney Island’s days are numbered, destined to become yet another condo heaven, I feel as if I should get myself back down there before they destroy everything that I remember. And there is so very much. I remember my first glimpse of Brighton Beach bliss when we first moved to the area. Mom and I had just gotten off at the Ocean Parkway stop of the D train and we stood there transfixed at the sight of the ocean. The ocean was an hour’s travel and another world from the Eastern Parkway neighborhood that we had just come from. We had entered the subway from a baked-hot June street and emerged to an ocean breeze. And then later on, standing on the terrace of our apartment, I had my first glimpse of our Cyclone-Wonderwheel view and I was star struck.
Though I grew everyday accustomed to the view, I never tired of it. I would sit sleepless at my window at three in the morning, gazing at the lights of the turning Wonderwheel, listening to the distant sounds of people having a good time. I even remember the smell of the hotdogs mixed with popcorn and cotton candy. Though there was always plenty of junk food to indulge in, we locals stuck to Nathan’s Famous hotdogs and french fries, the grease saturating the cardboard containers they were served in, ketchup dripping down the sides.
The cotton candy vendors never stopped spinning and the ice cream came hard and soft serve. I think that you could search from one end of the boardwalk to the other and never find a single place that sold “healthy” food. It was all glorious junk and we licked our fingers without worrying about calories.
One afternoon Steve and I planned to go on some of the rides and then stop at Nathan’s for lunch. We decided to try a new ride in Astroland. It consisted of two cars suspended on long metal rods that turned around a central base, passing each other as they spun round and round from the ground to the air and back to the ground like the hands of some demented clock. Add to that the fact that as you were up in the air you were upside down and that made it downright horrifying. Scared as I was I still screamed delightedly, not realizing that Shatz had grown quieter as the ride went on. Years later, when Lisa and Mariel came along, I would learn that silence on a ride was not a good sign.
Finally it stopped and we staggered out. I babbled on about how wild the ride was and still Steve was quiet. Suddenly I realized how silent he was and looked over to see the strangest expression on his face, in fact I could have sworn he had turned green. I managed to get him over to a bench and after a few minutes he told me that he had never felt so nauseous in his life. It was then that we learned that he could do rides that went up and down and sometimes round and round but never upside down. After a while I looked over at my poor sick boyfriend and said, “I guess this means we won’t be going to Nathan’s?”
We last visited Coney Island when Lisa and Mariel were kids. Even then we saw signs of gentrification creeping into our adolescent playground. The streets were clean, there was no longer an “under the boardwalk” since they had filled the underside with sand, and a volleyball tournament was taking place on the beach. Volleyball in Coney Island--right then we knew that the end was near.
And now a New York Real Estate Company has bought nearly three quarters of the land around the amusement park and plans to build condos and a glitzy new batch of whitewashed amusements ala Disney. The earthy uniqueness, the gritty, sand-between-your-toes, grease-on-your-fingers-deliciousness will be gone leaving just a wisp of regret and the smoke of nostalgia-aching dreams.
Dressed For Success
Dressed For Success
After weeks of iffy cool rainy weather, summer has decided to show up today. But looking around at the crowd at the commuter rail stop you’d never know that. The woman next to me is wearing a coat and a scarf and over there a young girl is actually wearing boots, thick tights and a mini skirt. I look down at my toes peaking out from my sandals and wonder if maybe I’m the crazy one. Maybe the weather forecaster was a joking?
But then I get off at the Back Bay station and see everyone dressed for summer, so maybe it’s just the usual case of perspective. We all have our ideas of what is appropriate to wear on any given occasion. That has been brought home to me whenever I see what people at the Community Center are wearing.
The place where I work is very casual and I love that. Employees do double duty, working both in the office and out on the playground with the kids. You can’t go to work dressed in a skirt and heels if you’re going to be playing basketball later in the day or taking a group on a field trip. One of my bosses, Keith, embodies the center’s attitude towards “proper” dress. One day he comes in dressed in a suit and eye popping tie looking like a model for Armani, the next he’s in his office in jeans and a t-shirt. And it makes sense since on any given day he can be meeting with BCYF officials or moving furniture at the center. We all had a good laugh the other day when we read the city’s summer dress code directive.
During July and August the center turns into a summer camp offering arts and crafts, swimming, basketball and field trips throughout the city. So reading that t-shirts, shorts and sandals are not professional attire makes us laugh. I’d love to see whoever wrote that come out here in her business attire on a hot, sweaty August morning and make it through the day in her very proper outfit.
Except for Keith I’m usually the most dressed up of the staff. As the head of the GED school, I believe that I have to be a professional role model for the students. My appearance tells them that this is the way you should look if you’re serious about your studies and applying for a job. If I’m going to be lecturing them on what to wear when they go out on job interviews, I’d better put my outfit where my mouth is, especially since most of them have no idea what to wear for an interview.
Last week one of my students told me that she had a job interview the next day. I asked her what the job was and if she had a resume.
“It’s for sales and yeah I have a resume. I’m cool.”
“Okay then I’d like to see it. Maybe we can polish it up a little.”
“No, no it’s fine. I’m fine.”
I tried to explain to her that the school had a great piece of software that turned out dynamite resumes, but she insisted that she didn’t need it. I finally gave up then asked her what she would be wearing.
“What do you mean what am I wearing?” she asked getting angry with me. “I’ve had jobs before. I’ll wear what I always wear!”
I looked at her t-shirt and jeans and my heart sank. I suggested to her that she might like to change things up and wear a skirt. She looked at me as if I were completely crazy. She told me that she didn’t even own a skirt.
“Well then how about a nice pair of dress pants, a blouse with a collar and shoes not sneakers?” I asked. She thought about it for a minute then told me that she’d think about it. When I saw her afterwards she told me that she didn’t get the job then agreed to stay after school so that we could talk about “job stuff”.
When I hear myself insisting that my students dress differently, present a certain kind of resume and even sit and talk in a certain way, I feel awful. I ask myself why we all have to cram ourselves into the same mold to achieve some part of success. Why should this one way be considered socially correct and another wrong. But then I realize that as a teacher though I can work to try and change the system until that change comes I have to guide my students through the maze that is our social job network. So I tell my students that it’s all a game and I will help them play it to get what they want.
So we turn out the resume that looks impressive even for someone who has no GED and we practice interviewing. And I tell them to lose the silver hoop earrings that spell, SEXY, ditch the 5 inch red stilettos and fuchsia v-neck blouses that announce way too much. And they go out dressed like correct, business-like, drab mannequins. Like peacocks into sparrows. And I hope that I’m doing the right thing, because they can’t help but lose a huge part of their vibrance, brilliance and originality. And I’m not so sure that that’s a good thing.
After weeks of iffy cool rainy weather, summer has decided to show up today. But looking around at the crowd at the commuter rail stop you’d never know that. The woman next to me is wearing a coat and a scarf and over there a young girl is actually wearing boots, thick tights and a mini skirt. I look down at my toes peaking out from my sandals and wonder if maybe I’m the crazy one. Maybe the weather forecaster was a joking?
But then I get off at the Back Bay station and see everyone dressed for summer, so maybe it’s just the usual case of perspective. We all have our ideas of what is appropriate to wear on any given occasion. That has been brought home to me whenever I see what people at the Community Center are wearing.
The place where I work is very casual and I love that. Employees do double duty, working both in the office and out on the playground with the kids. You can’t go to work dressed in a skirt and heels if you’re going to be playing basketball later in the day or taking a group on a field trip. One of my bosses, Keith, embodies the center’s attitude towards “proper” dress. One day he comes in dressed in a suit and eye popping tie looking like a model for Armani, the next he’s in his office in jeans and a t-shirt. And it makes sense since on any given day he can be meeting with BCYF officials or moving furniture at the center. We all had a good laugh the other day when we read the city’s summer dress code directive.
During July and August the center turns into a summer camp offering arts and crafts, swimming, basketball and field trips throughout the city. So reading that t-shirts, shorts and sandals are not professional attire makes us laugh. I’d love to see whoever wrote that come out here in her business attire on a hot, sweaty August morning and make it through the day in her very proper outfit.
Except for Keith I’m usually the most dressed up of the staff. As the head of the GED school, I believe that I have to be a professional role model for the students. My appearance tells them that this is the way you should look if you’re serious about your studies and applying for a job. If I’m going to be lecturing them on what to wear when they go out on job interviews, I’d better put my outfit where my mouth is, especially since most of them have no idea what to wear for an interview.
Last week one of my students told me that she had a job interview the next day. I asked her what the job was and if she had a resume.
“It’s for sales and yeah I have a resume. I’m cool.”
“Okay then I’d like to see it. Maybe we can polish it up a little.”
“No, no it’s fine. I’m fine.”
I tried to explain to her that the school had a great piece of software that turned out dynamite resumes, but she insisted that she didn’t need it. I finally gave up then asked her what she would be wearing.
“What do you mean what am I wearing?” she asked getting angry with me. “I’ve had jobs before. I’ll wear what I always wear!”
I looked at her t-shirt and jeans and my heart sank. I suggested to her that she might like to change things up and wear a skirt. She looked at me as if I were completely crazy. She told me that she didn’t even own a skirt.
“Well then how about a nice pair of dress pants, a blouse with a collar and shoes not sneakers?” I asked. She thought about it for a minute then told me that she’d think about it. When I saw her afterwards she told me that she didn’t get the job then agreed to stay after school so that we could talk about “job stuff”.
When I hear myself insisting that my students dress differently, present a certain kind of resume and even sit and talk in a certain way, I feel awful. I ask myself why we all have to cram ourselves into the same mold to achieve some part of success. Why should this one way be considered socially correct and another wrong. But then I realize that as a teacher though I can work to try and change the system until that change comes I have to guide my students through the maze that is our social job network. So I tell my students that it’s all a game and I will help them play it to get what they want.
So we turn out the resume that looks impressive even for someone who has no GED and we practice interviewing. And I tell them to lose the silver hoop earrings that spell, SEXY, ditch the 5 inch red stilettos and fuchsia v-neck blouses that announce way too much. And they go out dressed like correct, business-like, drab mannequins. Like peacocks into sparrows. And I hope that I’m doing the right thing, because they can’t help but lose a huge part of their vibrance, brilliance and originality. And I’m not so sure that that’s a good thing.
Blackstone Love Affair
Blackstone Love Affair
Please don’t hate me when I tell you that I love my job. Since I spent most of last year dreading each morning that I had to go to work, I feel I’ve earned this honeymoon that I seem to be on right now. And I’m keeping my fingers crossed that it won’t end--the job or the honeymoon.
I’m the manager of the GED program at the
But it’s not the local cuisine that makes this such a wonderful place to be—it’s the people. I have two bosses--Mike, who represents the
Our program’s secretary, Lalitta, describes the community center staff as a close, loving, dysfunctional family. So far I’ve seen the close but not the dysfunctional but then I’m not yet one of the family. I need to be here much longer and overcome the countless hurdles that they’ve dealt with for years. At a staff meeting last week, an administrator from BCYF explained how the difficult economic situation in the city would affect us. He told us, “You have to do more with less and do it with a smile.” Sonia, the no
I watch them all, Sofia, Tanya, Keith and Natalie, do their jobs, do them well and do them with smiles for the kids they care for and I realize that whether the community realizes it or not, it would be much poorer without them. And I know that I can do no less for my school.
If you work in Adult Basic Education (ABE), you don’t do it for money or glory. Greg teaches the highest level class in the morning then manages the Allston-Brighton site at night. For 20 years he’s been a guide to all the students who have come determined to better their lives. He does it calmly, quietly, and well. He deserves a medal. Vanessa, who teaches the mid level class, reminds me of my Lisa--young, enthusiastic, out to change the world, and I think she just might. And Lalitta, our program assistant and counselor, works two ABE jobs, no complaints, no regrets, just does it easily with humor, helping the students when they’re lost, applauding them when they succeed.
The students grab our hearts. Last week I was impatiently tapping my foot as I waited for my class to quiet down when Deanna started laughing. “We’re a handful are we?” she said. “But confess you love us!” And I laughed and told her, “Yes I think I do.”
There’s Joan from
Tonya regrets dropping out of high school and waiting so long to return. She battles illness to come to school every week. When I read Langston Hughes’ poetry to the class she “gets it” every time—right to the heart and soul of it. But when I mention that we’ll be starting math soon she tells me that math is a four letter word. Her friend, Deanna is a single mom who drops her daughter off at school then races to class. She writes poetry, loves the computer and refers to herself and Tonya as the class clowns. But she’s serious about studying forensics and I’m serious about helping her.
Mercedes and Diomarys are friends from the
Ramutu is quiet but has a quick laugh and surprises us with her sense of humor. And then there is our only gentleman, Jeff. Dear Jeff. He brings us snacks to share along with his sense of humor and belief in God. I enjoy his French accent, his sheer exuberance and his love of learning.
My class. My new family. I spend restless nights wondering how to teach them more effectively; how to make it interesting, fun. How to help them through this educational maze to that eventual prize—a high school education. My job. What a joy it is.
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